Life, narrated

Now that Quinn is attempting full sentences, we're having a blast hearing what's going on in that head of his. Mostly what we hear is narration. The moment he wakes up in the morning, he starts talking to himself, narrating each and every move he, the dogs or either of us make. "Go see Rosie? Eat? Go for walk? Look! Mama getting out of bed. Mama is putting coat on. Baba is walking up the hill."

Just this week, after MUCH work, he is starting to answer our questions about things that have already happened. What did you do in school today? What game did you and Nana play? What did you do while you were outside?

And just today, he started expanding on those answers, turning them into actual conversations. At dinner tonight he told me that he and Baba watched the sun go down. Now it is dark, he said, but he wanted the sun to go back up in the sky. I told him that the sun would go up, but not until he woke up in the morning. "Sun go up now," he said. Not yet, I told him. Just like you need sleep, the sun is sleeping. We went round and round about that and you could really see him trying to wrap his head around the concept. After dinner, while he was playing with my cell phone, he hit some feature that activated the voice control and the phone invited him to "Say a command." "Tell it to do something," I told him. He looked at the phone and commanded, "Wake up the sun!"

Pee pee on the potty!

 

Every day since last July when I bought this "Cars" potty seat, I have dutifully sat Quinn on top of it. And every time he has dutifully sat there, looked at toy catalogs or played with an envelope of potpourri, and then smiled sweetly at me and announced, "All done potty." Never has he deposited anything in there, mind you. Until now! One night I noticed a drip or two and made a BIG deal out of it. A couple nights later we got a tiny little squirt - bigger deal - and the third night an actual, bonafide pee pee. "Look!" he announced, pointing. "Pee pee come out the penis!" BIG PARTY. All the excitement prompted him to put the potty on his head and christen it a "potty hat." This kid is immature in many ways, but his sense of humor is crazy sophisticated.

Since then he has been doing his thing almost daily -- If I get him to the potty at the right time, he'll go; if not, he'll just use his Pullup (now known as "underpants."). One day he even added a bonus feature: "Poo poo come out the bootie!"

So we're getting there. Finally.

Oh, Thomas, I love you so...

My little "helper"

Christmas with Quinn was a true joy. He loved lights and Santa and Frosty and "Ru-fall" (Rudolph). And after watching "Barney's Christmas Star" he came to believe that every tree should have a star on top.

We had a really nice visit with Tom's parents, and while there we took Quinn to see the lights at his beloved Candy Cane Lane TWO times. Tom set up a string of lights in our room and hung the star that was too heavy for the tree but looked very nice on top of the curtain rod. (Every day when Quinn would see his grandparents' tree he'd suggest to them, "Star on top tree? Angel down?")

This picture has nothing to do with Christmas, but it's my fave of the season. A few days after Christmas we went shopping to spend our Macy's gift cards from Obaachan (Japanese for grandmother). I was shopping for a coat and Tom was corralling Quinn. Suddenly he called me to come quick, and I happened to have my camera in hand. Here is what I saw:

Is 3 1/2 the perfect age for Christmas?

I haven't posted for a while because we've been having too darn much fun! Quinn is LOVING Christmas, and seeing him enjoy it is a total joy. He loves the lights and Christmas trees most of all, and gets quite perturbed if he sees a tree without a star on top (all pine trees should have stars, he believes). He also digs Santa - the big guy came to visit his school, and Quinn was one of the first to jump right up in his lap - as well as "Frosty Snowman" and "Ru-fall" (the red-nosed guy you might know as Rudolph.

The awesome part is, he has no understanding yet that presents are part of the equation. I'm sure that will change by next year, so I'm enjoying it while I can!

Raindrops keep falling on my tongue

It doesn't rain much in Tucson, which is maybe why Quinn got so darn excited last time it happened. He ran outside, screamed with glee and opened his mouth wide.

But the pictures say it better than I can:

A stranger in town

Recently we were in San Francisco and spent an afternoon in Chinatown. We took Quinn to a park to play, and we loved how much it felt like China. Grandparents were sitting on benches chatting as kids played. We were the only parents hovering over our kid, and it was obvious the old folks thought we were pretty ridiculous.

Eventually a father arrived with a remote-controlled helicopter. That's right up Mr. Things That Go's alley, so he bopped over with the other kids to have a look. What happened next was so interesting. Quinn looked at the helicopter, and the kids - all Chinese-speaking - looked at Quinn. It was like they knew he was like them, but different.

I happened to have my camera ready and captured the moment.